How To Decorate A Candle With Tissue Paper

Custom Decorative Candles

Mother’s Day is only 12 days away so here is a tutorial for taking an ordinary, plain candle and turning into something beautiful.

Choose a light colored candle: white, cream, tan or beige so the image can show through. I got these white, jasmine scented candles from Target for $2.99. They smell fabulous!
First you have to find the image you want to put on the candle. Once again, I am partial to the vintage images so it was back to The Graphics Fairy. Since it is spring, I chose this picture of birds.

Download the image and figure out how tall your candle is. Mine is 3 in x 3 in. I left the sticker on the bottom so the instructions go along with the candle.

Add the image to Microsoft Word, rotate the page so it is in landscape mode. Adjust the image so that it is as tall as your candle and that it is centered on the page. Use the rulers on the side and the top to make sure the measurements are right.

Attach a piece of tissue paper to a pieces of printer paper by putting glue around the edges. This will help keep the tissue paper in place as it goes through the printer.

Load the tissue paper into the printer…

and print the image onto it.

Trim the tissue paper in a long strip that is the same width (or a little smaller) than the height of your candle. Cut the glued sides off so now you just have the tissue paper.

Wrap the tissue strip around your candle to make sure it fits. Trim more of the tissue, if necessary.

Flip the candle over so the image is face down. Put a line of glue directly on the candle.

Smoothing the tissue out, attach the ends to the glue. This is just to hold the tissue in place.

Now your tissue is set in place. In the picture above you can see the texture of the tissue.

You need your heat tool next. A heat gun or embossing tool works the best but a hair dryer will work as well, it will just take longer.

Blow the heat at the candle moving slowly over the tissue paper but being careful not to stay in one place too long or the wax will start to pool. As the wax begins to melt it will seep through the tissue paper. It is super fun and really cool to see how it works!

Soon your whole candle will be smooth wax with the tissue paper image underneath. (well mostly, as you can see there are wrinkles over on the right of my candle)

Wrap some cellophane around the candle and add some raffia or ribbon to the top.

Oh no! Make sure it is attached well on all edges to the piece of paper. Would it work to tape the edges down? Maybe some printers are just too strong for the tissue paper. I use an Epson Workforce 600 and have made around 20 candles this way. Good Luck!